


OBSERVATIONS 
IN FRANCE 



FRED B. SMITH 




Class JjJHlO 

Book < £4? 

Copyright N? 



CCFMHGHT DEPOSIT. 




Secretaries Ready for Front Line Trench 



OBSERVATIONS 
IN FRANCE 



FRED B. SMITH 



ASSOCIATION PRESS 

New York: 347 Madison Avenue 
1918 



Copyright, 1918, by 

The International Committee of 

Young Men's Christian Associations 



OCT 24 1918 



■CI.A506299 
•7 i C 



FOREWORD 

Perhaps it is unnecessary to excuse the 
appearance of this small book; but both the 
reader and the author will be happier if it 
is remembered that no attempt is made to 
present conclusions about the war or the 
countries involved, but simply a statement of 
vivid impressions. It is hoped that they may 
help somewhat to keep those at home faith- 
ful in the period of that greater sacrifice yet 
to be demanded before the complete victory 
is achieved. Though not particularly super- 
stitious, I have been led to have a rather high 
estimate of "first impressions." In a variety 
of experiences they have often proven of 
value, concerning people, places, and events. 
What is presented here is largely just the 
impressions of things seen and heard, people 
met, and meetings participated in, at over 
eighty different military centers — from the 
sea ports to the front trenches, to battle lines 
and back to rest camps. 

There was no "scientific investigation," the 
favorite boast of most transients. I did, 



however, give unusual attention to the ques- 
tion of the morale and morality of the Amer- 
ican Expeditionary Force and have confi- 
dence in the accuracy of the conclusions ar- 
rived at upon these points. 

I am dissatisfied most in not being com- 
petent to describe more adequately the 
gracious work of the Young Men's Christian 
Association. It is so varied, so unique, so 
timely, that it can be fully appreciated only 
by those who see it at first hand. 

Most of my time was spent in France. 
However, I paid a short visit to the British 
Isles. My experience confirmed the impres- 
sion that we Americans have been right in 
our high estimate of Great Britain's service 
in this war. Her readiness to sacrifice and 
her solid courage, evidenced in 1914 when 
she entered the conflict, are even more 
marked in her life in 1918. "Sacrifice" to 
her seems incidental, "honor" fundamental. 

The most casual visitor in the war area is 
moved with a sense of reverent gratitude 
for the spirit of moral fortitude manifested 
by America's Allies. They are worthy of 
our best ; we must be worthy of their best. 

F. B. S. 



CONTENTS 

Foreword 

I. The Overseas Young Men's 

Christian Association . . 1 

II. France and the War . . 21 

III. The American Expeditionary 

Forces 35 

IV. A Square Deal . . .63 
V. All Eyes Looking to America 69 



THE OVERSEAS YOUNG MENS 
CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION 

Dressed in a Young Men's Christian As- 
sociation uniform, traveling over the sea as 
the leader of a party of Young Men's Chris- 
tian Association secretaries, and looking 
forward to Young Men's Christian Associa- 
tion work, naturally I was anxious most of 
all to know what the Association would be 
like in this new situation. I had known it in 
twenty-five years of very happy relationship 
as employed officer; in Japan, China, the 
Philippine Islands, India, South Africa, 
Australia, New Zealand, the British Isles, 
and continental Europe; in the Spanish- 
American war, in the mobilization camps and 
in Cuba; in most of the great cantonments 
in the home country since April, 1917: but 
now I was eager to see what it would be like 
in France in the Great War. 

My curiosity was highly rewarded. First 
1 



OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 



of all, I was tremendously impressed with 
the magnitude of the headquarters organiza- 
tion. Fortunately, I arrived at a time when 
Dr. John R. Mott was in Paris holding con- 
ferences with all the departments, planning 
for extensions commensurate with the needs 
of the ever-enlarging army, and looking into 
the future to make provision for all the con- 
ditions that are yet to arise in the long 
months and possible years of the war. 

Then I came in contact with E. C. Carter 
and Fred B. Shipp, the executive secre- 
taries — a rare combination of two men, each 
with qualifications very different and yet 
each the complement of the other. Mr. Car- 
ter, the far-sighted diplomat, busy adjusting 
a legion of relationships; Mr. Shipp, the 
calm business executive — they were dis- 
patching great activities clear down through 
the whole machine, intended to serve every 
soldier and sailor not only of flie American 
Expeditionary Force, but also any and all 
fighting for the cause of the Entente Allies. 
But this is only a favorable beginning in 




Fred B. Shipp and E. C. Carter 



OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 



anything like an understanding of the vast- 
ness of this job of supervision. 

If you enter one door of this great head- 
quarters at 12, Rue d'Aguesseau and look 
around, it reminds you of a great trans- 
portation bureau. There is S. C. Wolcott, 
Transport Director; with his associates, he 
is driving furiously to get the secretaries 
moved to their places of service — no mean 
task amid the problems of war necessities. 
Outside a line of immense trucks is waiting 
for supplies to be transported over country 
to the 700 huts. Suits, uniforms, blankets, 
cots, tents, auto parts, canteen outfits, books, 
magazines, organs, and goodness knows 
what else — all these are being called for and 
must be supplied or the real work will suffer. 

If you enter another door, it reminds you 
of a modern banking house. Here associ- 
ated with Mr. Shipp is F. A. Jackson, the 
Comptroller of the New York Life Insur- 
ance Company in Europe, acting as Chair- 
man of the Finance Committee, and A. M. 
Harris of the Harris-Forbes Company of 



THE OVERSEAS Y. M. C. A. 



New York City, serving as Treasurer. Ac- 
counts have to be audited, disbursements ar- 
ranged, salaries adjusted, purchases made. 
Literally millions of American dollars are 
being handled with as great skill as in any 
modern corporation. To the man at home 
some faint idea of the magnitude of this de- 
partment's responsibility may be gained in 
knowing that the "turn over" is more than 
$35,000,000 this year. 

If you enter another door, you are re- 
minded of a Methodist Conference keenly 
on edge when appointments are being made 
or bishops elected. Here associated with 
Mr. Carter and Mr. Shipp is Frank W. 
Pear sail, State Secretary of the Young 
Men's Christian Association of New York 
and Miss Martha McCook, daughter of the 
late Col. John J. McCook, in supervision of 
the Personnel Bureau. Upon them rests the 
supreme responsibility of the final word in 
assigning the men for the huts and the 
women to the canteens. Over twenty-five 
hundred such decisions have alreadv been 



6 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

made and hundreds more will be made every 
month. If this were the only task at head- 
quarters it would be a tremendously tense 
and vital place. 

If you enter by another door, it seems at 
first sight like the assembling of the Na- 
tional and American league baseball clubs, 
the opening day of a basket ball tournament, 
and the grand rally of world famous tennis 
players all combined. Here Dr. McCurdy 
and his staff, including Dr. Naismith, the 
father of basket-ball, are planning for the 
physical upkeep of millions of fighting men ; 
they plan to have recreation and wise infor- 
mation on health questions and sex hygiene 
go hand in hand. Alike the military author- 
ities and the soldiers are calling for this im- 
portant service. 

If you enter by another door, you may 
think you are entering Yale, Harvard, 
Princeton, or some other great university. 
Here is Dr. John Erskine of Columbia Uni- 
versity, planning a campaign of educational 
work largely based upon technical studies 



THE OVERSEAS Y. M. C. A. 



intended to make the soldier more efficient, 
to increase his possibilities of promotion, to 
keep his spirit sound, and finally to bring 
him back home better prepared to continue 
his normal vocation. 

If you enter by another door, you seem 
to be in some great entertainment bureau, 
theatrical assembly, and Grand Opera re- 
hearsal all at one shot. Here is Charles M. 
Steele in charge of the amusement section. 
The best in the world are enlisting, that their 
talent may be at the service of the great 
army. E. H. Sothern, John Craig, Elsie 
Janis, and a host of others like them are be- 
ing toured and giving the best they have in 
these huts. Five-dollar patrons on Broad- 
way get no better than our soldiers. 

If you enter by another door you surely 
think you are in the center of some Bible 
Society, evangelistic conference, or theologi- 
cal seminary. Here Dr. Robert Freeman of 
Pasadena, California, and Bishop Brent of 
the Protestant Episcopal Church are in 
command. They are trying to meet the de- 



8 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

mands of the 1,800 secretaries as they call 
for Bibles, testaments, hymn books, relig- 
ious literature, Bible study courses, and 
speakers for the religious meetings. They 
are preparing special services for Mothers' 
Day, Memorial Day, Easter, Fourth of 
July, Thanksgiving, Christmas. They are 
editing, issuing, and distributing religious 
literature — prayers, hymns, and the like. 
More insistent and deeper than all the ap- 
peals from all over the field is this call for 
help to make the challenge of God, of Jesus 
Christ and the Christian life, the supreme 
thing in the lives of the men of the Army and 
Navy. The doubting and fearful about this 
element will find quick relief in this room of 
the throbbing headquarters. 

If you enter by still another door, you 
seem to have moved to France permanently. 
Here "Dri" Davis, of crew fame at Syra- 
cuse University and the hero of the Young 
Men's Christian Association work in Con- 
stantinople in the early years of the war, is 
in charge of the "Foyers du Soldat" cam- 



THE OVERSEAS Y. M. C. A. 



paign. Responding to the call of the French 
Government, the work being done in the 
American huts is being reproduced in every 
great center of the French Army. Plans 
are now being executed for 2,000 of these, 
600 of them being already in operation. It 
seems almost a dream to think that this 
Christian work of the Young Men's Chris- 
tian Association with our own soldiers should 
so have impressed the French officers that 
they have importuned their own Govern- 
ment to open the way for this wonderful 
opportunity. 

The main doors of headquarters in Paris 
have many side doors and supplementary 
departments. Every hour you are there you 
meet a new outreach of this agency of gen- 
eral direction in its masterly effort to make 
the whole organization as highly efficient as 
possible. Some of the following who are in 
the service suggest the power being added 
through these side doors : 

W. E. Seatree— member of Price, Wa- 
terhouse & Co., in charge of our accounting. 



10 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

Mr. Seatree's firm is perhaps the leading ac- 
counting firm in the world, with offices in all 
the principal cities of America and Europe. 

Dr. E. P. Lord, of the Faculty of Dart- 
mouth College, who heads up the medical 
service for YMCA workers in France. 

T. E. Brown, of Philadelphia, construc- 
tion engineer, who has general charge of the 
erection of huts throughout France. 

A. M. McFadyen, General Manager of S. 
H. Kresge 5c and 10c stores, who has gen- 
eral supervision of the Post Exchange and 
Canteen Service. 

J. F. Mason, President of Dodge Pub- 
lishing Co., of New York, who is the business 
executive of the Library Department. 

W. D. Foster, of the Community Motion 
Picture Co., of Boston, who directs the Mo- 
tion Picture service. 

Hon. Franklin S. Edmonds, of the Phila- 
delphia Bar, who heads up the whole ques- 
tion of soldiers' leave. 

It seems as though nothing known to earn- 
est men prompted by the love of God is 



THE OVERSEAS Y. M. C. A. 11 

being overlooked in this wise station of 
supervision, through which the consecrated 
energies of American men and women are 
being set in motion for the welfare of the 
American Expeditionary Force and the win- 
ning of the war. 

But I was stirred to the very depths by 
my campaigns up on the border line of the 
battle. I was sent for a short series of meet- 
ings into one of the districts of which Albert 
Chesley is the supervising secretary. Every 
kind of work ever done in the history of man 
I found being done that the soldiers may be 
kept right while they fight. "Huts" 
thronged with men day and night, writing 
letters, playing games, and singing songs — 
I soon learned that in most places these huts 
are absolutely the only decent places where 
these men can go in and sit down awhile out- 
side the barracks, which are so crowded there 
is scarce room for bunks enough, to say 
nothing of space for recreation. The can- 
teens are presided over by 500 American 
women, and here in a short time the men get 



■ 








Bp - v Ji 




^^Bl iTt ,.r «L|P 






^^1 



Dr. Margaret S. Cockett and Miss Martha McCook 
Supervisors of Women's Canteen Work 



THE OVERSEAS Y. M. C. A. 13 

a taste of real home life and memories. 
Chocolate, coffee, lemonade, cakes, sand- 
wiches, cigars, cigarettes, and a hundred 
other little things are sold at small expense. 
Bible classes, church services, and evangel- 
istic meetings are held. Outside, athletic 
directors are conducting basket-ball, base- 
ball, and games of every description to keep 
cheer in the men's hearts, as well as giving 
health talks to guard the men against the 
soldier's greatest enemy. I had the privi- 
lege of witnessing the arrival of a brand new 
baseball in a camp where they had been with- 
out one for seven months. The "top ser- 
geant" shouted down the line, "A baseball, 
boys!" They broke loose in a shout as en- 
thusiastic as might have been expected if the 
news had been that the Kaiser had surren- 
dered. "A mail from home" would not have 
been received more cordially than was that 
baseball. It did not take me long to under- 
stand why the wise General Pershing has 
pleaded for more and more Young Men's 
Christian Association secretaries; morale is 



14 OBSERVATIONS IX FRANCE 

even more vital than guns and powder in 
war, and I found this organization present in 
full swing to answer this demand. I had an 
unexpected rare privilege in an interview 
with a captain of the French Army, who had 
seen much of this Christian expression in the 
war. He said: "The most famous thing in 
the history of this war will not be the battle 
of the Marne, of the Somme, or of Verdun, 
but the work of the Young Men's Christian 
Association." His enthusiasm knew no 
bounds as he described what he had seen. 

I followed Chesley and Hoffman up to the 
front, where we found a Negro regiment, 
and on into the trenches. At the opening of 
the "boyau" there was a dugout ten feet 
square, fitted up as a Young Men's Christian 
Association hut with a colored Secretary in 
charge. I followed them on into the front 
line trench to within 120 yards of the 
Bosches, up to the last soldier in that guard, 
a colored boy from New York. From every 
city, town, church, and home in the United 
States clear to the trenches this Young 



THE OVERSEAS Y. M. C. A. 15 

Men's Christian Association gives its service 
of supplies, good cheer, and sound morality 
to the soldiers. The guns were hurling shells 
over us both ways. An air battle was on 
over our heads and the earth shook with the 
roar of cannon, but the Association went 
quietly on with its work as unconcerned as 
it would be on Fifty-seventh Street, in New 
York. At the close of that day I under- 
stood what the soldier meant whom we 
passed on the banks of the Gironde as our 
ship neared Bordeaux. He was one of a few 
camped to guard a dock, and recognizing 
soldiers on the ship, he shouted: "Have you 
got a Y M C A on there? If you have, give 
it to us!" 

The impressions of those first visits were 
confirmed as I traveled from camp to camp, 
till I had visited and spoken in over eighty 
of these huts. They were also confirmed in 
a short visit in England and Scotland, where 
the same plan is being carried out under the 
direction of Mr. Ewing and his associates 
for the American forces in the British Isles. 



16 OBSERVATIONS IX FRANCE 

That the pressure of temptation is terrific 
upon these men is only a mild statement. 
They are away from home, they are some- 
times depressed, they have opportunities for 
evil from which they were more protected at 
home; but nevertheless, taken as a whole, 
they are keeping right morally. Credit may 
not wisely be given entirely to any one cause 
or agency for their general good order. 
Home training at fireside and in church is 
showing its power with many. The attitude 
of the Government upon vital morality is 
an ever-present inspiration. The words of 
sound Christian advice and warning spoken 
by General Pershing and other officers are 
an element of great strength to them. The 
chaplains, all too few in number, are entitled 
to warm praise for their faithful service to 
the highest interest of the enlisted men. 
Other Christian organizations share well in 
the good results being secured, but as the last 
culminating voice this Young Men's Chris- 
tian Association is the savor of life, hope, and 
salvation to these soldiers bv tens of thou- 



THE OVERSEAS Y. M. C. A. 17 

sands. My knowledge of many Christian 
enterprises has been rather intimate for over 
twenty-five years ; yet with due appreciation 
of the value of most of them, I do not hesi- 
tate to say that this work is the most remark- 
able I have ever seen. It is meeting the most 
stupendous moral crisis in the century and is 
meeting it in a manner so effective that it 
must give profound satisfaction to anxious 
mothers, fathers, and other relatives at home, 
as well as to all who love patriotism and pray 
for victory. 

If America could see as I see today, this 
work would not call in vain for men, women, 
or money to prosecute the effort to the fullest 
degree — to the last regiment in France, 
Italy, and England, as well as at home. 
More Christian business men would close 
their desks and come over. More earnest, 
mature women would put aside their duties 
and quickly find their places in these can- 
teens. More local Associations would reor- 
ganize, to loan yet others of the employed 
officers to man the unoccupied camps and re- 



THE OVERSEAS Y. M. C. A. 19 

lieve the already vastly overworked men 
now serving. More churches with red- 
blooded pastors would rejoice to release their 
ministers for a period to share in this un- 
paralleled Christian opportunity. Check 
books would open and safety boxes give up 
their reserves, that every dollar needed might 
be forthcoming. This work has passed the 
sentimental, although it is still that; but it 
is a war measure of first importance and a 
future national asset in preserving the health 
and morality of these men, the active leaders 
to be of the new order, economic, civil, and 
religious — the fathers of the next genera- 
tion. America does well to respond by gifts 
of her money for Liberty Loans, by gifts of 
her sons to fight the battle of guns, but it 
will be the tragedy of the nation's history if 
she fails to sustain this work to the utter- 
most! 



II 

FRANCE AND THE WAR 

There is no more difficult task than to at- 
tempt a statement of one's impression of this 
nation in the center of the battle zone. Con- 
flicting reports had put me in a mood pre- 
pared to doubt almost everything I might 
see; and, therefore, much of what follows is 
the result of being convinced against my 
preconceived ideas. 

I was not altogether a stranger to France, 
having visited it several times and been 
charmed by its life and people. I had read 
its history with some care. But like millions 
of people, I had been following it since 1914 
only through books, magazines, papers, and 
returned folks; therefore I waited with pe- 
culiar interest to see it, for four years the 
ground of the mightiest war of Adam's race. 
Slowly I moved into it and had my vision in 
this manner. 

At the first I was surprised, and a little 
disappointed to find everything apparently 

21 



22 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

so normal, so calm, so much the same as when 
I had seen it just a little while before the 
war. Coming in at a southern port, the first 
trip was by daylight eight hours to Paris. 
There were some military camps along the 
way and a good many soldiers, but not more 
than can be seen in riding the same distance 
almost anywhere in the United States. The 
train, a beautifully equipped one, started on 
time and reached Paris on time. No delays, 
no excitement — just regular high grade 
traveling — a first class dining car, and 
plenty to eat of the best any land ought to 
afford. I had had four times as many in- 
conveniences at home where the war was 
3,000 miles away as I had here within 100 
miles of the world's most titanic battle. 
Later the same conditions were found to be 
true on the railways to the north, right up to 
within twenty miles of the battle front, as 
well as east to Verdun and Nancy. 

The people were working quietly in the 
beautiful fields. They were riding in leis- 
urely fashion along the lovely roads. The 



FRANCE AND THE WAR 23 

fields were green, the flowers were bloom- 
ing, the birds were singing, and all seemed 
serene. The next morning I walked down 
the Boulevard in Paris, and here again there 
was a little disappointment. Cabs, omni- 
buses, and subways were running regularly. 
Shops were open with the usual tempting 
windows. Looking at the prices, I saw they 
were about as favorable as those in New 
York. I had carefully stocked up with 
plenty of films for my camera, having been 
told by the New York dealer that prices 
were "terrible in France." I saw the same 
films in Paris marked less than I had paid 
on Forty-second Street in New York. 
American shoes of standard brand were dis- 
played marked ten per cent less than they 
can be bought for in Boston where they are 
manufactured. The people bowed "Bon- 
jour" with the same grace as of old. No 
ruins were in sight. No guns could be heard. 
I walked through to the Tuileries gardens, 
and saw a merry-go-round running and the 
children stabbing for the brass ring just as 



24 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

they do at Coney Island. In the distance, 
as of old, stood the Eiffel Tower, Napoleon's 
Tomb, and the Madeleine. They looked just 
the same. Profuse advertisements of 
"Aida," to be sung that night, were on the 
bill boards. I bought a glass of pink lem- 
onade for ten cents at a nearby stand, drank 
it and sat down to think, wondering if this 
was after all the country where the Great 
War was raging. 

The French people do not flaunt their 
troubles and it took some time even to begin 
to see the marks of war. Slowly these 
marks were revealed. 

Of all of them the one that becomes most 
apparent and which stubbornly forces itself 
into one's presence everywhere is the sight 
of the women dressed in black. Aside from 
the unfortunates of the underworld, little by 
little I was made conscious of what has come 
to France by the fact that practically every 
adult woman was in black livery. Every 
home in the nation has its death, and every 
wife, mother, and sister her sorrow. This 



FRANCE AND THE WAR 25 

is no mere figure of speech, it is a cold, ter- 
rible fact. Many a home in which there 
were two, three, four, able-bodied men, in 
the spring of 1914, now has none or possibly 
one. I saw women at manual tasks in num- 
bers that were overwhelming. To keep the 
people fed and the machines going, they 
have been called to bear the heaviest burdens 
ever carried by their sex. Something has 
been added to the line "For men must work 
and women must weep." The war has made 
the women of France weep ; but it has done 
more — it has made them the great burden- 
bearers. The longer one looked, the more 
war and its horror could be read in the faces 
and lives of the women. They are farming, 
working the munition plants, running the 
railroads, carrying the baggage in railway 
stations and hotels, operating street cars, 
busses, and heavy trucks, digging ditches, 
laying water and gas mains, as well as per- 
forming those tenderer duties of earlier wars 
in hospitals. If a comment can be added 
which may seem apart from this statement, 



26 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

I will suggest that this view of woman power 
has thoroughly, completely, and everlast- 
ingly committed me to female suffrage. If 
in a world crisis women will rally with smiles 
on their faces to such a physical test, it is 
ridiculousness gone mad to say they may not 
speak on Election Day. Admiration has 
not increased for wild-eyed, tangled-haired 
street corner haranguers, but they are inci- 
dental to the larger justice due these women 
war-winners. 

Then, in a yet closer study, it was ob- 
served that all the able-bodied of the male 
population of middle years were gone. This, 
too, came as a rather slow impression, but 
gradually became intense and depressing. 
Absolutely no man able in body, between the 
years of eighteen and fifty, except in uni- 
form. No fine distinctions of the "first," 
"second," "third," or "fourth" class are 
mentioned. Those with "dependents" are 
just the same as those unattached. The 
physical test of fitness is only to be able to 
see, march, and carry a rifle and a pack. 



FRANCE AND THE WAR 27 

The draft on France man power is terrible. 
The young lads and gray-haired men have 
taken up the heavier tasks without a mur- 
mur. War is soon written on the faces of 
these feeble, aged men and upon young lads 
prematurely made old by unseemly burdens. 
Then, I moved toward the front and on 
into the war zone and into the front line 
trenches, and then by automobile one hun- 
dred and twenty miles through the devas- 
tated country, past beautiful villages 
wrecked and deserted, into the silent, ruined 
walls of Verdun. Looking from the hill of 
the Marne, fields dotted with graves of the 
dead of battle could be everywhere seen. I 
heard from the lips of an old saint, a French- 
man to whom I had a letter of introduction, 
the face-to-face story of the frenzy of the 
Huns as they tore through that garden spot. 
In one destroyed village, into a little low 
roofless room fifteen feet square a priest has 
carried a few remains from a wrecked 
cathedral, to preserve so far as may be the 
memory of God. A few beautiful seats were 




A French Chaplain at the Front 



FRANCE AND THE WAR 29 

there. On the walls six feet high were paint- 
ings that would not be out of place in the 
Metropolitan Museum, but the faces of 
Christ and Mary had been mutilated by the 
Germans. Marble pieces of Christ on the 
Cross had been viciously hammered, just to 
show the hate of that army for anything held 
sacred by the French. Once in a while some 
half-starved, pinched face would peep out 
from a door, one of the little group which 
had been too poor or too weak to get away. 
At another place we had a view of one plot 
of ground where not less than 6,000 French 
soldiers lay buried* martyrs to the cause of 
liberty. Little by little it becomes clear that 
practically every wheel turning in the fac- 
tories of the whole nation is answering not 
the natural needs of the people but the stern 
necessities of war. All the higher schools 
and universities are absolutely closed. The 
peasants of the north are seen with a few 
belongings on a cart or wheelbarrow or, more 
often, on their backs wandering southward, 
destitute and homeless. When I had 



30 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

summed up, then and not till then did the 
"hell" of war become real. Wrecked homes, 
lands, schools, factories, churches, and hopes 
in the north present a picture of the black- 
ness of heart of the system which precipitated 
the slaughter. 

After one passes that first impression that 
things seem to be so normal and undisturbed 
by the war, there comes the overwhelming 
knowledge that nothing is normal, every- 
thing is changed. An oft-repeated expres- 
sion which at first I could not understand 
tells the story. It is heard from the people 
by the roadside, in the railway station, in the 
army camps, and everywhere — "C'est la 
guerre!" "c'est la guerre!" Just war, just 
war. For, notwithstanding that calm outer 
appearance, all of France from north to 
south, from the Channel to Switzerland, is 
under the ponderous weight of war. All the 
natural hopes and plans of the France of the 
spring of 1914 have been shot to pieces. 
The French have placed every possession — 
human, political, religious, and economic — 



FRANCE AND THE WAR 31 

on the altar of sacrifice, to win the war not 
only for themselves but for the world. 

The way led to Domremy, the birthplace 
of Joan of Arc, by the fields where she saw 
her visions ; and as we looked deeper and 
deeper into the sacrifice, calm courage, and 
heroism of France in this hour, it seemed as 
though there might be heard again the voice 
of Joan, with Rousseau, Rochambeau, and 
Lafayette echoing it, calling across the sea 
to America for liberty. It is a great people 
that can stand this shock without crumpling. 
Millions dead, millions wounded and perma- 
nently incapacitated, billions of francs spent, 
a large area of territory completely ruined ; 
oppressed by a type of prolonged war more 
beastly than the wild Zulus propagated in 
their worst days; facing, it may be, many 
weary months and possibly years more be- 
fore the victory — amid all this they are full 
of courage in their home life and their army 
is standing like adamant, ready to bear 
everything to the end. France has been the 
cradle of the world's great ideals of human 



32 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

liberty. She has fought gloriously for these 
in the past. There is something pathetic be- 
yond expression in France bearing again the 
largest burden of sorrow and sacrifice in this 
new and greatest struggle for human lib- 
erty. But she will emerge greater and 
grander than ever. The more one looks and 
studies France in this crisis, the greater be- 
comes the desire to stand with uncovered 
head and say : "Five la France!" 

I cannot better present my own feelings 
about France than to accept the sentiment 
expressed by a colonel of an American regi- 
ment which is fighting, shoulders touching, 
with the French. He had been months in 
camps from the south to the north. He had 
seen both the patient fortitude of the people 
and the splendid courage of the soldiers. He 
is a calm, well-seasoned American, every 
inch a soldier. I met him first in Chicka- 
mauga, in 1898, as an officer of our army. 
Now at mess, far to the north under the roar 
of German guns, he said, "I have been in 
two wars for my country and am proud of 



FRANCE AND THE WAR 33 

the chance, but I am too old to go again. If 
Uncle Sam gets in another scrap, the 
younger chaps must do the job. I shall 
never go again unless France should have 
another war and then if I can help her I will 
put on a uniform and fight once more. 33 

No thoughtful American can study the 
France of 1918, recall the momentous years, 
1914-17, and think of Rochambeau and 
Lafayette, and the Statue of Liberty in 
New York Harbor, without feeling the force 
of this soldier's pledge. 



Ill 

THE AMERICAN EXPEDI- 
TIONARY FORCES 

Beyond the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciation, the Young Women's Christian As- 
sociation, the Red Cross, France and its 
Army, interest centers primarily in the 
actual facts concerning the men of the Army 
and Navy in this new war situation. The 
heart of America is wrapped up in these 
young men. Therefore, it is easy to under- 
stand with what anxious eagerness we em- 
braced the opportunity of seeing them and 
of learning the truth about the conditions 
surrounding them. Coming into the scene 
of the real conflict, I was glad for the wide 
range of my earlier contact with this fight- 
ing force. I had seen these young men as 
they left home with the bands playing and 
the people cheering, and again as they were 
"getting settled" in the big cantonments, 
and been with them many times in the long 
months of training. I had seen them in the 

35 



36 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

embarkation camps, had crossed the sea with 
them and knew the story of ocean travel, had 
stood on the dock in France and watched 
the unloading, and had observed them enter 
the final training period before going up 
front. During all of this they had been car- 
rying on in all kinds of unattractive manual 
labor, policing camp streets, carrying wood 
and water, building fires, shining boots, dig- 
ging trenches, and performing a multitude 
of similar jobs — none of which had been 
mentioned in that fiery patriotic speech 
when the home orator called upon them to 
go out and fight to make the "world safe for 
democracy." I had been present when 
under the cover of the dark night they had 
at last been silently marched into the 
trenches, and also with them in that front 
line where they stood by day and slept by 
night in the persistent rain and the inde- 
scribable mud. Once more I had been with 
them after the battle, when many had been 
wounded, and then in repos camps resting 
up to "go back at them" again. I was pre- 



THE AMERICAN FORCE 37 

pared for my impressions of the Expedi- 
tionary Force by a varied and rather com- 
plete round of experiences, and with this set- 
ting went at the task of summarizing my 
thoughts with real zest. Among those most 
conspicuous are these: 

Camouflage 

"Camouflage, O Camouflage!" — when the 
Great War is over and most of the names 
of the battles, generals, and great events are 
forgotten, you will remain the outstanding 
feature of this world war. 

It permeates everything. When the 
army arrives in France, it arrives just Some- 
where, when it moves, it moves Somewhere. 
Everything is nothing and nothing is not on 
the map. Nobody knows where anybody is 
in the army and would not tell you if they 
did. Cities famous around the world have 
lost their identity. I called one of that kind 
on long distance telephone one day and was 
severely told by the operator that there was 
no such place in France, and then asked if 



38 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

I would like to speak to "Podunk." Inas- 
much as that was the only tangible thing 
heard that day, I said, "Yes." After waiting 
a long time I got the connection, only to be 
told the name had been changed and I would 
have to wait till the next day to get the new 
name. The ships on the sea are camouflaged 
to look like any old thing except what they 
are. The big guns of the artillery are made 
to appear as creeping things of the dust. 
The aviation centers are garnished to mimic 
the ancient forests of cedars of Lebanon. 
I drove one day with a Young Men's Chris- 
tian Association secretary toward a hut at 
the front through a valley that seemed as 
peaceful as the countryside in New York 
State. Suddenly there was a roar that made 
the earth shake. A "barrage" had been or- 
dered without asking our permission. We 
then discovered that that whole valley was 
full of artillery; a thousand big guns had 
been set going by the tick of a telegraph in- 
strument. But for that shooting we would 
not have known there was a cannon within 



THE AMERICAN FORCE 39 

ten miles, although we were within fifty 
yards of some of them. They disguise the 
roads where they are exposed to enemy fire. 
Things that look like nothing are something, 
but you cannot find out what it is or what 
they are. "Somewhere in France," there is 
a camouflage factory upon immense propor- 
tions for manufacturing camouflaging de- 
vices. Nobody knows where it is, nobody 
knows who runs it, nobody knows what they 
use to make it of, nobody knows what they 
make, nobody knows where it goes. Just 
camouflage. Really this illusionizing proc- 
ess is one of the marvels of the war and gives 
evidence of an almost matchless genius in its 
execution. The following verses by Private 
Walter MacDonald, band leader of the 
164th Infantry, give a vivid picture of the 
soldiers' idea : 

SOMEWHERE 

It's a sizable place this "Somewhere," 

As big as the whole battle zone; 
We eat it, we sleep it, we breathe it, 

And it causes us many a groan. 



40 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 



We left from the port of "Somewhere/' 

And we traveled "Somewhere" on the sea, 

'Til we landed again at "Somewhere/' 
And it sounds mighty funny to me. 

We left "Somewhere" for "Somewhere," 

And we're camping "Somewhere" for a spell; 

It's got so, when one mentions "Somewhere," 
We put up an awful yell. 

There's a "Somewhere" in France and in England. 

And "Somewhere" else at the front; 
It was "Somewhere" the boys were in battle, 

Just "Somewhere" bearing the brunt. 

It's "Somewhere" the Censor is cutting, 

"Somewhere" from letters we write; 
It seems we've been "Somewhere" for ever, 

And it has us — sure — ready to fight. 

At night we no longer have nightmares, 

We dream of one continuous trip 
From "Somewhere," back home, to "Somewhere/' 

When we sleep in slumber, we slip. 

Geography's all gone to the races — 

The face of the map has been changed, 

"Somewhere" in, "Somewhere," via, "Somewhere," 
And our minds are completely deranged. 

Ye Gods, is this world mad completely, 

Will sanity ever reign again; 
Will we ever get back from "Somewhere" to Earth? 

If so — Oh, Lord, tell us when. 



THE AMERICAN FORCE 41 

Democracy 

Whether all of the enlisted men of the 
Army and Navy are fully informed as to 
the scientific angles of the democracy for 
which they have come to fight is doubtful. 
As I passed a soldier one night up near the 
front sitting at the windward side of a soup 
kitchen in a cold rain, he looked sadly at me 

and said: "Isn't it h trying to make 

the world safe for the Democrats?" I 
wouldn't vouch for his being able to pass a 
severe examination upon "autocracies," 
"part democracies," or "full democracies"; 
but the Army itself is the greatest illustra- 
tion of the great doctrine. It is a leveler of 
all forms, conditions, and future expecta- 
tions of men. It teaches a respect for per- 
sonality, regardless of information, that has 
not hitherto been known in life. At any 
moment, at any place, under any condition, 
one is apt to be speaking to angels unawares. 
I have met as private soldiers in the mud of 
the trenches multi-millionaires, sons of ease, 
luxury, and privilege, and at the same spot 



42 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

and time the poorest farmer boy. I met a 
graduate of one of the world's greatest uni- 
versities sitting humped up in a dugout with 
a chap who did not know the difference be- 
tween an adjective and a crown prince. At 
another place a musician who has shone with 
luster in Grand Opera, is familiar with the 
great composers, and personally acquainted 
with the best directors, is in the same pla- 
toon with a crowd who could not whistle 
"Dixie." Here is a soldier who told me he 
had once traveled the seas with his father 
in a private yacht on guard with comrades 
who crossed in steerage. One Sunday night, 
"Mothers' Day," in a hut standing in one 
spot I became acquainted with three men, one 
a graduate of Amherst, one of Yale, and 
one of Pratt Institute. In the same meet- 
ing, crowded like matches in a box, were 
negroes, Indians, and South Sea Islanders. 
I noticed when we were singing that the 
Yale man was sharing his hymn book with 
the blackest negro who ever came from Ala- 
bama. This is the democratic army fighting 



THE AMERICAN FORCE 43 

to make democracy universal. They are 
sleeping in the same beds, eating the same 
mess, telling the same stories, singing the 
same songs, and longing for the same vic- 
tory. 

This is not to be observed alone among the 
ordinary soldiers and sailors. It is com- 
mented on freely that there has never been 
known such a friendliness between officers 
and men as that being worked out here. Of 
course there is discipline and must be; of 
course there are some snobs among the great 
number of officers and also some grouchy 
soldiers. The snobs are mostly Second Lieu- 
tenants who feel their importance and are 
afraid they may not be properly recognized. 
But taken as a whole the relationships are 
typical of the new democracy and brother- 
hood for which the world travails. Some of 
us were afraid at first that conscription 
might not be the best method for securing 
our Army. We felt men might lose some of 
the glory of volunteering, that the result 
might be an army of malcontents ; but these 



THE AMERICAN FORCE 45 

fears have been proven groundless. These 
men feel the glory of the task and they are 
satisfied that their selection has been "on 
the square"; and while they may not have 
thought it all out philosophically, they seem 
somehow to know that they typify what 
they fight for. 

The situation also seems to speak almost 
the last word of judgment upon artificial 
human distinctions. Side by side in these 
ports, camps, and trenches, fighting for a 
common cause of human freedom, there are 
to be found Jews, Gentiles, Protestants, 
Greek and Roman Catholics, Buddhists, 
Mohammedans, Hindus ; red, brown, yellow, 
black, and white men; Russians, Poles, 
Portuguese, Italians, French, English; sons 
of the latest word in modernism, children of 
the most ancient philosophy of the Orient. 
These warriors, representing scores of na- 
tions and creeds, cradled in the most diverse 
traditions, are becoming one in the strength 
of their united purpose : what a promise for 
the new day at the end of the conflict ! 



46 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

Physical Condition and Morale 

No one coming in intimate contact with 
these men can fail to be at once impressed 
with their physical ruggedness. They are 
swarthy, erect, and alert in step. This gives 
evidence that they have been well fed, and 
frequent visits to their mess offer final proof 
of this fact. The Government has evidently 
fully determined that food conservation 
shall be a home recreation and virtue and 
not an army discipline. They do not have 
chocolate eclairs or peach melbas served very 
often. Plum puddings are reserved for the 
home coming. But good meals every day, 
lots of splendid meat, white bread, and vege- 
tables in abundance are pushed up to them 
regularly. It is a striking thing to learn 
that the over-fat fellows have the superflu- 
ous worn off and the thin fellows have filled 
out. There is some illness and there are 
some deaths, but I venture the belief that 
both are in much less degree than would have 
been true if they had remained at home. This 



THE AMERICAN FORCE 47 

condition also is an index of the care being 
given to sanitation in the camps. The men 
do not have rooms with hot and cold running 
water, but they are protected from bad 
water or infected surroundings. When they 
have camped in some dirty village, as often 
occurs, the first order and duty has invari- 
ably been the "clean up." I have noted with 
care conditions in over eighty camps visited 
and failed to find one with any suggestion 
of sanitary surroundings that would lead to 
illness. This observation has been a delight 
when I remembered some of the camps in the 
Spanish- American War of 1898, where 
camp food and sanitation seemed to have 
been a minor consideration with those in 
command. 

Physical condition has its unquestioned 
bearing on morale, of which so much is said. 
A sick man can hardly be expected to be 
enthusiastic about anything. The Govern- 
ment has been wise in laying a sound, physi- 
cal platform upon which to build a spirit of 
victory. I found the men full of good cheer, 



48 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

ready to play games with real delight. At 
one camp, there were four football games 
and ten baseball games going on at one time ; 
and the rooting was like bedlam let loose. 
The one never-ceasing desire with them all 
is to hurry up and get into the actual fight- 
ing. This desire is not simply a "craze for 
something else," as some have said, but 
rather the expression of a deep belief in the 
war, and a determination to win — a restless- 
ness to go over the top and do their bit. I 
spoke one night to 800 men from two regi- 
ments that had been in battle and had been 
hit hard, and when I asked them where they 
wanted to go next — with what seemed to be 
one voice they yelled, "Back at 'em again!" 
They are trained hard as iron, they are full 
of good spirit, they are dominated by an in- 
telligent patriotism, and they will fight to 
the end as their chance comes. 

The more visible evidence of these traits 
is in the Army, because so much of the fight- 
ing is on land; but in three visits to navy 
centers the same was found to be true of the 



50 OBSERVATIONS IX FRANCE 

sailors. The German Navy, apart from the 
submarine, prefers to remain a silent partner 
in the war and is where "no self-respecting 
navy ought to be." I found the men of our 
naval wing proud and enthusiastic in their 
task, keeping the path of the ocean safe for 
the transports. I saw one convoy of destroy- 
ers and warships bringing troops into har- 
bor, and it seemed as though there was a 
smile of delight on the bow of each of those 
destroyers, as again they reported with their 
job well done. It is a grand Navy and a 
grand Army, sound in wind, limb, and heart, 
and it will yet make the Hun tremble. 

Morality and Religion 

Even above physical condition and 
morale, in the minds and hearts of "home 
folks," stands the question of morals and 
religion. The date when the war will end, 
the extent of our victory, the new map of 
Europe — these are all themes of absorbing 
interest, but secondary to the great character 
issue. Anxiety is so keen upon this point be- 



THE AMERICAN FORCE 51 

cause men wisely believe that as goes the 
battle in the realm of morality and religion 
so eventually will all the rest go. To boast 
of fine morale and sound physique while 
morals decay would be an empty satisfaction 
to an anxious home people. 

Rightly to understand this aspect of the 
situation is no easy task. 

It is confusing because of the conflicting 
impressions which are possible as one comes 
in contact with our men. I can easily under- 
stand how one man happening to be in some 
particular spot might be led to believe that 
morality had broken down and that irre- 
ligion, drunkenness, and licentiousness were 
to be the eventual order. There have been 
occasional outbursts of this kind. I can at 
the same time understand how another man 
seeing at another angle might be equally de- 
ceived into believing the men were all being 
fitted to become deacons, vestrymen, and 
Sunday school superintendents. There are 
manifestations that suggest this possibility. 
Needless to say neither of these conclusions 



52 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

can be accepted as sound. The searcher for 
the real truth at this point ought to go armed 
with the axiom, "Beware of the single inci- 
dent." 

It is also confusing because it is so diffi- 
cult to bring the home folks into sympathy 
with the changing views of these enlisted 
men as to what morality and religion mean 
to them. I have heard no man in the Army 
or Navy, at home camp, or in France, call in 
question the validity of the decalogue. But 
I have been shocked sometimes to learn the 
virtues the warrior regards as preeminent. 
They are different from the traditionally ac- 
cepted ones taught in our Sunday schools, 
churches, and home Young Men's Christian 
Association. That is a mild conclusion. This 
greatest war, these vastest armies and navies, 
these mightiest battles, this awful slaughter 
of life and property are forging a new moral 
code for the participating men. 

If you ask an audience of sailors or sol- 
diers, as I did on more than one occasion, to 
name what they regard the worst sin in the 



THE AMERICAN FORCE 53 

world, they will not go back to the list heard 
hysterically condemned in the revival meet- 
ings and probably not to those frequently 
heard in sermons. For illustration, to preach 
to these audiences against playing cards, 
dancing, and theater-going would be the su- 
preme humor of the century. Playing base- 
ball on Sunday afternoon is boasted of as a 
Christian grace ; it is positively spoken of as 
a mark of piety. Even profanity is not, to 
them at least, a serious offense. After some 
weeks in this scene it is easy to understand 
what Harry Emerson Fosdick meant when 
he said, "I have never till now heard pro- 
fanity when it sounded like a prayer." 

Leaving to others the academic discussion 
of these failings, the soldiers and the sailors 
condemn with burning in their souls such 
as these — ''Cowards." Profanity, drunken- 
ness, and gambling will find a gentle rebuke, 
if any, but that a coward ought to be shut 
out from the light forever is the general view 
of the soldier. I believe this hatred of cow- 
ardice is universally regarded as the cardinal 



54 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

grace in the soldier's code of morality and 
to be guilty of cowardice the supreme sin. 
Selfishness is a close second. "Will he share 
his chow with a pal? Will he divide his kit?" 
This is also the acid test of good character 
with soldiers, rather than keeping the 
"morning watch" or testifying in the prayer 
meeting. Generosity — to have a standing 
of worth in the soldier's bible a man must be 
generous with his money, generous in judg- 
ment of his comrades' frailties, generous to- 
wards the officers' foolish orders. A man 
who passes 95 per cent on this examination 
will have very few questions asked in the 
barracks of the kind propounded in the 
"Pastor's Class" or in the hour of confirma- 
tion. Humility bulks large in the analysis 
of character made in the military camp. 
They spurn a blowhard, a braggart, a con- 
ceited ass. I found a soldier in a camp way 
up front, the son of a man I had known and 
respected, who seemed to be in bad with his 
company and very unhappy. I made in- 
quiries to learn if I could help him. He had 



THE AMERICAN FORCE 55 

not been drunk and did not gamble, and 
about all I could find to his discredit was 
summed up by his best acquaintances, when 
I urged them to tell me what the trouble was, 
by saying: "Oh, he blows too much!" A 
casual observer might have suspected him of 
some gross breach of the moral law by the 
manner with which his company mates 
shunned him. Before judgment is passed 
upon the morality of the Army, this new 
state of mind they have entered into must 
be recognized. Whether right or wrong, it 
is a vital factor. They care positively not 
at all for the genesis of these qualities, but 
to have them is the beginning of morality 
and to be without them is the sum of all vil- 
lainies in their estimation. 

It is confusing properly to estimate this 
question of morality, too, because of a cer- 
tain idealism at home, largely prompted by 
foolish lecturing and preaching about how 
"war ennobles/' That sort of talk is dan- 
gerously close to insanity. Better far and 
nearer true to accept Sherman's definition 



56 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

and then try to make the best of it. This is 
typified and made amusing in casually look- 
ing over some of the literature sent by well- 
meaning friends to the Young Men's Chris- 
tian Association Headquarters in Paris to be 
distributed to the men in the service. I saw 
a 400-page book entitled "Daniel's Vision 
of Heaven"; another, "Meditations in the 
Gloaming"; and a tract, "By the Still 
Waters." Literally tons of this stuff reveal 
how far afield a lot of people are about the 
mind and condition of the soldiers. 

We may as well all know that these men 
are not coming home each with a Bible in one 
hand and a hymn book in the other, repeat- 
ing the twenty-third psalm and singing, 
"Will there be any star in my crown?" 
Idealism at home is sure to sustain a severe 
shock if we fail to reckon with those newer 
accents in morality to which the men have 
been led by trench or camp experience. 

It becomes confusing again when the 
morality, so-called, is associated with relig- 
ion. Never have I felt so called upon to 



THE AMERICAN FORCE 57 

know myself at least what was meant by 
"Religion" as before this vast uniformed 
audience. Not dogmas, creeds, technical ex- 
periences, but deeds are the profound de- 
mand of the military man. With this un- 
derstanding I make bold the confident as- 
sertion that, when all the story is told, our 
Army and Navy will stand morally the best 
that ever went on battle-field or sea. I have 
heard this many times from officers of allied 
armies, from the lips of the people of France, 
from old naval and army officers of our 
forces, whose experience and knowledge 
went back to other wars. I believe it from 
my own observation and memory of the 
Spanish- American war. 

Do these men believe in God? Yes, a 
thousand times. Men who doubted that in 
civil life, believe now. Do they believe in 
Christ ? Yes, I am persuaded that thou- 
sands who have prayed other days without 
the thought of Christ as the answer to their 
cry, are thinking of his life and teaching of 
whom the angels sang: "Peace on earth, 



58 



OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 




Delivering Supplies to Front Line Huts 



good will to men." Do they believe in im- 
mortality? Yes, emphatically. When a 
comrade who has been brave, unselfish, gen- 
erous, humble, "goes West" they cannot 
wipe him out at "taps." I have at times — 
not often, but enough to get a lead — tested 
them about the future of the Church and 
organized religion. They have found com- 



THE AMERICAN FORCE 59 

mon fellowship in the trenches, in a world 
crisis of material government*; they are to 
ask for a common altar, a common prayer, a 
common communion. Perplexed about 
many questions, they are longing for a way 
to go on when they get back and carry out 
that for which they have fought and for 
which they have seen so many of their com- 
rades die. At their side, in barrack, trench, 
and camp are the chaplain and the Young 
Men's Christian Association secretary, 
typifying very largely these religious ideals. 
They hear them asking no complicated ques- 
tions about theology. They see Catholics 
Greek and Roman, Protestant Episcopal 
and Nonconformist, Jewish Rabbi and Wes- 
leyan, all standing side by side at the burial 
of the dead, saying a united prayer of hope. 
They see the Young Men's Christian As- 
sociation preaching but little, serving day 
and night. They have seen these men and 
women wearing the uniform of a Christian 
organization typifying the Church and the 
message of Christ. The secretaries were 



60 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

with them at home training camps, they were 
with them at' the "shove off" dock as they 
sailed away, they were with them on the 
transport during those long anxious days. 
They greeted them at the "somewhere" over 
there, they found them at the communica- 
tion trench, and on the last outpost where the 
smell of death was familiar. They remem- 
bered them as comrades in the battle. They 
had served coffee, chocolate, sandwiches, 
when there was no time or place to get them. 
They have all of these never-to-be-forgotten 
memories of what these God-fearing, hu- 
man-loving people did in the name of Christ. 
They said but little, they served much. 

In the influence of this upon religion, it 
is well to be reminded that the whole Army 
and the whole Navy have been members in 
some form of this Young Men's Christian 
Association parish. Taken as a whole by 
and large, these men have been asking the 
deepest questions of life, duty, and eternity, 
to be expressed in courage, self-sacrifice, and 
service. Religion, yes, of the kind they 



THE AMERICAN FORCE 61 

dreamed of as they lay on the open field — 
a religion of comradeship and service. 

Every city in the United States will one 
day have its quota of returned veterans of 
this war. Every church will have its young 
men come back, but changed. Sad will be 
that hour for organized religion if its call 
fails to move the emotion and wills as they 
were moved when in camps, huts, barracks, 
ships, dugouts, and trenches the men sang: 
"I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a 
hundred circling camps; 
They have builded Him an altar in the 

evening dews and damps ; 
I can read His righteous sentence by the 
dim and flaring lamps, 

His day is marching on." 
They have been passing through great ex- 
periences, let them be called by any name, 
"spiritual" or something else, it matters 
little. They will not tolerate petty, hack- 
neyed platitudes in moralities or trivialities 
in church expressions. 



IV 
A SQUARE DEAL 

Since writing the earlier impressions of 
the Expeditionary Force, I have been for 
the third time clear through to the end of the 
front line trench. The memory is vivid. 
These men have been seen again, these sons 
of American soil, the best in mind, body, 
and years the nation has, literally staking 
everything to win this war. They have put 
the last asset they possess upon the altar of 
their country's honor — their future prospects 
if they live, their health if they live, their life, 
if the winning of the battle demands it. All, 
everything is staked. They know and un- 
derstand fully that this war is not one whit 
more theirs than it is the war of the people 
at home. Because they are of the age and 
condition to happen to be wearing the uni- 
form and are to do the fighting, does not 
make them any more responsible for the war 
than the men and women who stay at home. 
They are the last men living to ask pity. I 

63 



64 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

hear no such request anywhere. They do 
not ask for charity. They do not ask to be 
coddled. There will be very few slackers 
in this oversea contingent of over a million 
already on the soil of France. They are 
there and are gladly ready to do their bit to 
the uttermost. 

What they do ask and have a right to ex- 
pect is a square deal. 

The peril of slackers is in the United 
States, not in France. Every man, woman, 
and child at home must do some sacrificial 
service commensurate with that so freely 
given by the soldiers. I have just read a 
letter from a man somewhere in America, 
complaining because there are so many 
"drives." "Liberty Bonds," "Thrift 
Stamps," "Red Cross," "Young Women's 
Christian Association," and "Young Men's 
Christian Association," have gotten on his 
stingy nerves. He ought to blush at his 
words and ought to have ten days in a close- 
up front trench in the rain and mud, with 
Bosche shells falling around him day and 



A SQUARE DEAL 65 

night. He would think of the appeals at 
home as a happy opportunity rather than an 
irksome duty. The "at homes" must give 
and give and give again, if they are to save 
their own souls during this era of the world's 
tragic history. The Government must do 
its duty through the quartermaster's and 
ordnance departments to fulfil its part in the 
square deal. A man in this official service, 
who by neglect or inefficiency permits these 
men to suffer or be needlessly killed, ought 
to be shot at sunrise. The nation as a whole 
ought by generous contributions to see that 
every dollar necessary is promptly forth- 
coming for their moral care and physical up- 
keep. It is no time for any man to figure 
what percentage of his income is to be given 
away. This crisis demands a sacrifice of not 
only the income but the principal as well, 
and if need be the hypothecating of the fu- 
ture. The soldier has invested all three of 
these plus his comfort ; the man at home is a 
poor patriot who does less. There are many 
worthy calls, but as I have viewed them and 



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A SQUAKE DEAL 67 

have studied their work at first hand in camp 
and trench, I believe the Young Men's 
Christian Association to be most vital. I 
have already written my estimate of this 
work. In reiterating it, it may not be out of 
order to say that the writer is not an em- 
ployed officer of the organization and there- 
fore writes without any bias of executive re- 
sponsibility. But from the standpoint of 
patriotism, of an early winning of the war, 
of love for the Christian Church, and of a 
square deal all around, I pray God that the 
American people may of cheir abundance see 
that all the money required is constantly 
made available, that no soldier of the United 
States Army or sailor of the United States 
Navy shall go wrong morally without at least 
having had a fair chance to keep right. 



ALL EYES LOOKING TO 
AMERICA 

The passengers have just come in from a 
restful sight on the decks of the great ship. 
The gunners have been wiping out the guns, 
have pulled the tarpaulin over them and tied 
it down, as much as to say that the danger 
is over and all may have a good sleep. For 
hours and hours past they have never ceased 
their vigil by night or day. Once these same 
faithful gunners saved the ship and prob- 
ably some of our lives, so the passengers 
unanimously believe, for at least one sub- 
marine got inside the convoy and up to 
within a perilous closeness, in plain sight, in 
broad daylight, and then the ship's guns cut 
loose and she went down forever. We saw 
the lifeboats, which had been hanging over 
the side ready for quick action, brought in 
and also tied down where they belonged in 
the days before the war when all the people 
said, "Bon Voyage." Boat drills are over 

69 



70 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

and I have thrown away the card with in- 
structions to "report to No. 9 in case of an 
emergency." The life belts which many had 
carried constantly since the start have been 
discarded. The captain has come from the 
bridge for his first real rest in days. Every- 
body and everything seems to have been 
loosed from the clutch of a certain tension 
which held us as we passed through the 
"danger zone." We have sailed through un- 
certain waters. Six big ships have been con- 
voyed by six perfectly splendid torpedo boat 
destroyers. We have seen the Bosche 
"subs." We have dropped depth bombs. 
We have fired our own ship guns and "zig- 
zagged" our course till we were dizzy. 

At one spot we were told by an officer, 
"Just about there lies the 'Lusitania' " — 
with her precious toll of lives, assassinated by 
Germany, without warning ; at another place 
he pointed to where the "Tuscania" was hit 
and the American soldiers sent to the bot- 
tom. We have ridden over waters that held 
in their sad grip millions upon millions' 



ALL EYES LOOKIXG TO AMERICA 71 

worth of ships and cargo, to say nothing of 
lives, of untimely sacrifice. 

Notwithstanding these precautions, the 
marvel after all is the safety of the seas. 
Reports may come of a ship torpedoed, but 
not a word of fifty which proudly sail into 
European and American harbors without a 
mishap. Germany is defeated on the sea 
and every hour puts that peril farther in the 
background. In spite of methods resorted 
to in violation of all rules of warfare, any 
one of us would feel safer tomorrow if we 
were to start back over the sea and the same 
path than we would in anticipation of dodg- 
ing street cars and automobiles at the corner 
of Forty-second Street and Madison 
Avenue. 

Memory also takes me back over the weeks 
in France and England, most of them spent 
in the actual battle zone, where air raids were 
common, bursting shells a steady diet, the 
roar of cannon constant, wounded soldiers 
everywhere, and new-made graves the 
ghastly testimony of war's havoc. By a good 



72 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

Providence, now this conspicuous danger 
zone where life seems so uncertain, where 
hate seems so fierce, and where war seems 
to have become the daily task of all the peo- 
ple, is behind, and we all turn our eyes to- 
ward blessed America. She seems to be the 
hope of the whole world in this vexed hour. 
Everywhere in France, England, and Scot- 
land, I heard the hope of what America 
would do voiced by every tongue. I find 
myself today filled with this overwhelming 
thought of the stewardship of my own native 
people. I have passed this way many times 
and therefore the impressions are not due 
simply to the fact that I am coming home. 
True, a genuine American can never come 
this way without that sense of love and de- 
votion to his own being kindled afresh. But 
this time all of that natural feeling is moved, 
and something vastly deeper, a sort of pro- 
found depth of awe and a wonder whether 
America can live up to this new world re- 
sponsibility. Other times when en route 
with Europeans over this course, they have 



ALL EYES LOOKING TO AMERICA 73 

smiled and good-naturedly joked about 
America's eccentricities and juvenile ways. 
But not so now. Today there are great Brit- 
ishers, Frenchmen, and Italians hurrying to 
Washington upon official missions, all say- 
ing that as goes America so goes the world. 
These eyes are turned to us because they 
feel certain that we have the final key to a 
glorious winning of the war. I tremble a 
little in the presence of the unbounded con- 
fidence of our Allies that we will bring the 
men, ships, guns, and money yet necessary 
to win. They have fought a ruthless enemy 
for four long years. They are not "bled 
white," but they have suffered much. They 
have seen poor Russia, betrayed by a kiss, 
lie down to be robbed. Now America has 
come, they know of her resources in man 
power and dollars. They have an almost un- 
canny respect for her genius. They fer- 
vently expect the "trick to be turned" by the 
added strength she will bring. If I had 
power, in this moment, to speak to every 
man, woman, and child of my own Nation, I 



74 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

would say in tones, the strongest possible, 
We must pay the uttermost farthing to win 
the war. Our form of government is at 
stake, our liberty is involved, our honor is 
on trial. If America fail now, the stories of 
Lexington, Bunker Hill, Valley Forge, 
Trenton, Gettysburg, and Appomattox may 
as well be taken from public school text 
books and the children taught to forget our 
past. Not long ago General Pershing, bid- 
ding goodbye to some returning Americans, 
said: "Tell the folks at home, we can win, 
we will win, we must win." This ought to 
be the slogan of America till every line in 
President Wilson's fourteen articles of peace 
principles have been realized. Let no soft 
wind of seductive German philosophy turn 
us from this course, else these eyes that look 
toward us today with hope and confidence 
shall have looked in vain and future genera- 
tions will be compelled to say we were 
weighed in the balance and found wanting. 

It may seem presumptuous for an ordinary 
man to suggest anything of terms by which 



ALL EYES LOOKING TO AMERICA 75 

the war may honorably be concluded amid 
the wealth of proposals already at hand, but 
it would seem that the whole future of world 
relations justly demand that the war be 
steadily prosecuted till Germany is so thor- 
oughly defeated that the newspapers of Ber- 
lin publish acknowledgment of the collapse 
of the Prussian method of ruling the world. 
The war will only be half done if Germany 
is left to claim victory even among her own 
people. These longing eyes ask America 
to stand for a real victory, about which there 
can be no camouflage. 

The weeks have made apparent also that 
the eyes which turn toward America think 
not only of the immediate war issue, but are 
thinking, too, of the new internationalism 
which is being born and into which America 
is being thrust. Back in older days I do not 
recall hearing any questions asked about the 
views of America upon problems of Euro- 
pean politics. If we had any views they were 
not taken seriously. This is changed now. 
I was embarrassed again and again by being 



76 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

asked to give the American view of technical 
issues of trade relations, international courts, 
sea treaties, rights of small states, and legis- 
lative functions concerning which I knew 
but little or nothing. I remember vividly a 
conversation in 1905 with an English states- 
man who ridiculed our political methods 
rather severely. In meeting the same man 
now, he is found full of expectation that in 
the program of rebuilding the civilization 
which has been so badly shattered America 
will be a potent, if not a controlling factor. 
At every turn when the future with its plans 
is discussed, in some form or other, some one 
asks, "What will President Woodrow Wil- 
son say about that?" It would seem that 
his words, voicing America's new power in 
internationalism, have reached farther and 
gone deeper than any others spoken since 
1914. The United States may not hope, 
when the last shot is fired and the peace docu- 
ment is signed, to slip back into the quiet 
snug security of the "Monroe Doctrine" as 
her only responsibility. This nation has had 



ALL EYES LOOKING TO AMERICA 77 

an unexpected and unsought birth into the 
realm of world politics; and now, where 
courts sit and conferences convene, there will 
go the American, not for the purpose of 
guarding the western hemisphere alone but 
to share actively in the enforcement of jus- 
tice throughout the whole world. This reali- 
zation in Europe adds new zest to the eyes 
that peer out to the shores of the land beau- 
tiful, beyond the present danger zone. 

Far and away above all queries about how 
many warriors we may produce, or how 
many guns we may manufacture, or how 
many dollars we may spend, or what may be 
our vote on questions of world politics, I 
have been impressed that these eyes looking 
out from the danger zone of Europe are 
wondering if America may not be the hope 
of the new moral idealism which the world 
must discover if this passing out of the dan- 
ger zone is to be anything more than a tran- 
sient relief. At its tap root the present 
catastrophe is a breakdown in morality. Po- 
litical Germany, in the days at least as far 



78 



OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 




A Typical Front Line Trench Hut 



back as Bismarck, has been choosing the 
moral code of Voltaire and the Turk, rather 
than that of Christ and the New Testament. 
The Hague Conference was not wanting in 
ethical sense. The clause of neutrality was 
all that could be desired in letter. The whole 
thing collapsed for lack of moral earnestness 
in Germany. No matter what may be the 



ALL EYES LOOKING TO AMERICA 79 

terms of the peace to be written now, no mat- 
ter what may be the geographical adjust- 
ments, no matter what indemnities are 
agreed upon, no matter how severely the 
enemy may be defeated by the sword, unless 
a new great morality, wide and deep enough 
to influence the whole world, is promul- 
gated, the same devilish thing will happen 
again. This I found freely and heartily 
concurred in by French and Britishers alike. 
I was bewildered and made sometimes to 
tremble as I learned how much these eyes 
look out of the wreck of war across the sea 
to America as the hope of this new world 
message in morals. They have heard of how 
we with our cousins, the Canadians, are 
smiting the whiskey traffic which all Europe 
has not dared as yet to rebuke. They have 
heard of how these two nations by the sea 
have wiped out open vice, which seems. to 
flaunt itself at noonday on the European 
streets. They have heard that Canada and 
the United States with a border line of over 
three thousand miles have not a single gun 



80 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

of defense on either side, while European 
boundaries can all be followed by the forts. 
These eager-looking eyes may not be ready 
to follow these paths in detail, but I am sure 
there is suggested to them all, that somehow 
we have the secret of moral idealism with 
which the whole world must be imbued if 
these guns are to "cease firing" permanently. 

One of the greatest souls I met, great in 
British patriotism, great in loyalty to the 
war, great in knowledge of world politics, 
said to me with pathetic emotion: "Go to 
your President and tell him that the whole 
world expects him to set it right from its 
moral tangle." This I take to be suggestive 
of the hope these eyes express, as they peer 
through the fog, of a new leadership in the 
moral world, which can make brotherhood 
and good will supplant greed and selfishness. 

Knowing these facts, my soul revolts with 
indignation at the thought of any man on 
the soil of that land for which my heart longs 
today and my eyes anxiously wait who will 
do a dishonorable thing. True patriotism 



ALL EYES LOOKING TO AMERICA 81 

calls for sound morals. Let us make trick- 
ery in politics such a disgrace that a man 
would lose every friend if caught in an act of 
that kind. Let graft in business be 
branded with a traitor's shame. Let domes- 
tic infidelity become so vile that the guilty 
will have to walk the path of life as though 
without a country. As I feel today, any 
man guilty of these ought to be shot at sun- 
rise as they shoot traitors in a battle or spies 
in the camp. At the very core of this ques- 
tion is the vexed one of the standard of 
citizenship to be demanded by the United 
States in this period of reconstruction. I am 
fully persuaded that if we are to attain in the 
realm of this grander moral leadership, a 
higher plane of citizenship will be essential. 
We have peddled out far too cheaply 
"papers" to all sorts, kinds, types, and con- 
ditions. We have tolerated too long the 
noisy ranter with poison in his tongue, hurl- 
ing epithets at the very basis of the Govern- 
ment. Sometimes he has worn an "I. W. 
W." badge, sometimes he has occupied a 



82 OBSERVATIONS IN FRANCE 

chair in a university, sometimes he has been 
called a "preacher" of a kind. Whether the 
remedy is in new legislation, making the re- 
quirements of a more exacting nature, or 
whether it may be the enforcement of what 
we have, I am not fully assured. But I do 
know the hour has fully struck when talk of 
that character ought to cease. If any men 
or women under the Stars and Stripes, from 
ocean to ocean, from gulf to lake, do not 
like the system of government or the meth- 
ods of procedure which have brought the 
nation to such a glorious heritage, passports 
ought to be furnished them promptly and 
their departure made easy to other shores. 
Superb morals are an empty dream where 
anarchy is advocated and class hatred en- 
gendered. 

America, wake up, your heritage is great, 
your future is rich in power, the eyes grown 
weary of the strain of the "danger zone" are 
looking to you. A new sense of God, a big- 
ger interpretation of Christianity, a wider 
morality in internationalism, are your op- 



ALL EYES LOOKING TO AMERICA 83 

portunity as a contribution to permanent 
peace and universal brotherhood. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




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